Xinhua News Agency, Lausanne, June 23
Xinhua News Agency reporter Ji Ye Liu Qu
The 134th plenary session of the International Olympic Committee will open in Lausanne, Switzerland on the 24th. On the same day, the city hosting the 2026 Winter Olympics will be voted. After three consecutive Asian cycles of Pyeongchang 2018, Tokyo 2020 and Beijing 2022, the Olympic Games will come to Europe.
STOCKHOLM/Ole in Sweden and Milan/Cortina danpezo in Italy, the proportion of existing venues and temporary venues exceeds 80% of all venues, the budget for the Olympic bid was reduced by more than 75% compared with that of the 2018 and 2022 Winter Olympics, showing the new vane of the Olympic movement.
Proof: the Olympic games no longer burn money
This is the second consecutive time that the International Olympic Committee has ushered in the competition between the cities hosting the Winter Olympics with only two bidding places. Four years ago, Beijing defeated Almaty and successfully won the right to host the 2022 Winter Olympics. In that bid, Munich, Stockholm, Oslo and other cities withdrew one after another.
Coincidentally, in the process of bidding for the 2024 Summer Olympics, many cities also withdrew halfway. In 2017, for the first time in the history of the International Olympic Committee, it decided to host two consecutive Olympic Games at the same time, and declared Paris and Los Angeles to host the Summer Olympics in 2024 and 2028 respectively, ensuring the future stability of the Olympic Games.
The huge Olympic games no longer seem to be “hot cakes”, which is also forcing the IOC to carry out reforms. In 2014, the Olympic 2020 agenda pushed by IOC President Bach passed smoothly. This reform roadmap basically focuses on three major themes: sustainable development, improving credibility and attracting young people.
The “new standard” refined on the basis of the Olympic 2020 agenda was promulgated during the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, aiming at simplifying the bidding process, reducing the Olympic capital and sharing the pressure of the host, make the future Olympic Games more flexible, effective and sustainable.
The bid for the 2026 Winter Olympics will be the first to fully benefit from the Olympic 2020 agenda and the “new norms”, paying more attention to cooperation, flexibility and experience sharing. Cities interested in bidding for the Olympic Games know the requirements and benefits of hosting the Olympic Games from the International Olympic Committee through a one-year “no obligation” dialogue. At this stage, there is no need to submit a bid; the number of displays and reports required by the bidding city during the whole process has also been greatly reduced.
The IOC then provided experts and experience support throughout the whole process, and made more than 30 on-site inspections to formulate competition concepts, sustainability, heritage, market, finance, legal affairs, the competition operation and other suggestions are provided, and the IOC bears the relevant expenses; Finally, the IOC executive committee will invite suitable cities to participate in the Olympic bid based on the overall feasibility assessment of these cities.
The cities that intend to bid for the 2026 Winter Olympics initially included Calgary in Canada, Sapporo in Japan, Graz in Austria, Siyong in Switzerland and Erzurum in Turkey, the first four cities withdrew from the bid one after another, while Erzurum failed to get the candidate because of the “great challenge” of the bid plan.
STOCKHOLM/Ole in Sweden and Milan in Italy/Cortina danpezo plan to use 80% of the existing and temporary venues, while 60% of the 2010 and 2022 Winter Olympics. In addition, the operating cost of the Olympic Games is 20% lower than the budget of the previous two Winter Olympics bidding stages (about 0.4 billion US dollars), and the entire bidding budget is also more than 75% lower than the previous two.
Judging from the public support rate of this bid, the survey of the International Olympic Committee shows that the support rate of 83 percent in Italy is much higher than that of 55 percent in Sweden. According to media reports, the running budget of Italian events is 1.7 billion dollars, while that of Sweden is 1.4 billion dollars (without public funds). Previously, it was reported that the Sochi Winter Olympics actually cost $51 billion. In order to dispel people’s worries, the IOC very much hopes to pass a message through this bid, that is, the Olympic cost is controllable.
Competition: The Olympic adaptation City
On the morning of the 24th, the two bidding places for the 2026 Winter Olympics will make technical statements of specific details, and the final statement will be made to the plenary session in the afternoon. Swedish Prime Minister Levin and Italian Prime Minister Conte will both attend to assist their respective cities.
Italy has held three Olympic Games. In addition to the 1956 Winter Olympics, there were Rome Summer Olympics in 1960 and Turin Winter Olympics in 2006. Milan, located in northern Italy, is about 400 kilometers away from Cortina danpezo. Some small cities between the two cities will also hold some competitions. Previously, the bid plan of the three cities was changed due to the withdrawal of Turin.
Stockholm is a Southeast coastal city in Sweden, about 540 kilometers from Ole in the northeast of the country. In order to avoid the “white elephant project”, Sweden decided to place the snowmobile sled in Sigulda, a Latvians across the sea. This cross-border Olympic mode is no stranger to Stockholm. As early as 1956, the Melbourne Summer Olympics was held in Stockholm because of the issue of horse quarantine. Sweden has never held the Winter Olympics, only Stockholm held the Summer Olympics in 1912.
The chairman of the evaluation committee of the International Olympic Committee for the two bidding places and the Romanian Moralia said that the bidding places of the two countries both have good winter sports traditions and rich experience in running competitions, including first-class competition venues, enthusiastic audiences, mature volunteers and competition organization teams, and all regard Winter Olympics heritage and sustainable development as the primary consideration of the bidding plan.
The Beijing Winter Olympics has set up three competition areas. Now the two bidding places for the 2026 Winter Olympics are relatively scattered. In order to make full use of the existing venues, this decentralized competition mode may be more common in the future.
According to the evaluation report, this bid well combines ‘Athletes, heritages and sustainability’ as the core idea of the Olympic Games. In the comments around venues, heritage, etc. in candidature file, there are many references to challenges that are not suitable for the long-term development of the city.
Bach said: “In the past, we always asked how the bidding cities changed to adapt to the Olympics. Now we asked them how the Olympics changed to better adapt to the long-term development of cities and regions.”
The future: there may be major changes in the rules for bidding for the Olympic Games
aiming at the problem that multiple bidding cities quit halfway in the bidding process of the past few Olympic Games, the IOC plenary session may pass new bidding regulations, and the bidding method for the Olympic Games may undergo major changes.
The IOC earlier appointed a working group composed of five IOC members to propose amendments to the bidding regulations. The group was chaired by Australian Olympic Committee president Coates, the members include Li Lingwei of China, batkova of Slovakia, Wetstein of Argentina and encecra of Burundi.
This group put forward six suggestions for amendment, which will be discussed in the plenary meeting. If passed, these suggestions will be formally written into the Olympic Charter.
Coates revealed some of the amendments to the reporter. First, the future Olympic Games should not be limited to one city; Second, it is not necessary to select the host city in the seventh year before the Olympic Games; Third, replace the current “evaluation committee” with “future Olympic Games host committee” and will gain greater power to recommend multiple or single candidate cities to the IOC executive committee.
According to relevant sources, matters such as the preparation of the Olympic organizing committee, the organization and operation of events, and the construction of venues are mostly concerned at the working level, such as the Olympic Games department and Coordination Committee of the International Olympic Committee. And the real senior officials, such as Bach and members of the International Olympic Committee, are concerned about things related to the challenges facing the Olympic movement. For example, does the Olympic Games reflect frugality and whether it can hold a Save-Money Olympic Games? Is it sustainable and is there any plan for the later use of venues? Can you leave any legacy for the city? What is the impact of the Olympic Games on the ecological environment? These challenges are the place where the Olympic movement will set a “new benchmark” in the future.